Capturing the balance

“I was pretty surprised, I had no idea,” she said. “I thought he was breaking up with me on the top of the mountain. I was like ‘That’s really rude,’ but he was proposing so better than the breakup.”

The Bride

Between adventure and intimacy

For seven months Kevin Campbell carried the ring with him he would use to propose to now-wife Val Campbell. Wanting to make the proposal special, Kevin planned multiple hiking trips before finally popping the questions at the Top of the World at Sun Peaks Resort.

“Val was really good at ruining my plans,” said Kevin. “I had made plans multiple times (and) figured I wanted to do it on a hike or somewhere outside because we’re pretty outdoorsy people. I always kept making plans and she kept ruining them either not wanting to go on the hike or inviting friends along.”

Val admitted she had been dropping hints for Kevin to propose but was oblivious of his foiled plans and said she had no idea the Sun Peaks hike would end the way it did.

“I was pretty surprised, I had no idea,” she said. “I thought he was breaking up with me on the top of the mountain. I was like ‘That’s really rude,’ but he was proposing so better than the breakup.”

The couple saw a newlywed couple heading up the lift on their way down and realized Sun Peaks could make a great wedding venue.

“It actually ended up being where we wanted to be,” stated Val.

On July 7, exactly one year and a week to the day of the engagement, they were married at the gardens at the covered bridge in front of 85 of their closest friends and loved ones.

With a specific picture in their minds, the couple pushed their wedding date back one full week to ensure they would have Masa’s Bar & Grill as their reception location.

“Masa’s was the only thing that really stood out to us as being our style. It worked out really well,” explained Kevin.

The couple chose to let the venue’s beauty shine through adding minimal decor to play into their rustic theme. Both former BC Park Rangers, they decided to continue to incorporate their love of nature into their wedding favours.

“Everyone got a little Douglas fir tree. They were about maybe 10 inches tall and we wrapped them in burlap in the bottom so everyone gets to take a tree home and plant it and remember our wedding,” explained Kevin.

With little touches of personalization throughout the day, the most sentimental one for Kevin was Val’s incorporation of a red pom pom dahlia in her bouquet.

Val’s bouquet with the red pom pom dahlia.

“My mom passed away when I was in high school but we always had red pom pom dahlias in our garden and a lot of them,” he said. “It was something we’re kind of known for. Val had a red pom pom dahlia in her bouquet that she surprised me with.”

The couple chose to keep all the festivities down in the village to create a day for their guests to enjoy but snuck away with their bridal party to mid-mountain for some added adventure.

“We’re adventurous people we really wanted to get that picture of us coming down the chairlift,” he said. “It also gets you up into the mountains and meadows and flowers so we got that aspect of it that adventurous side. But we also got the convenience of having all the events down below for everyone else.”

With many of their guest joining them from out of province, the couple said the resort was the perfect location to converge. The resort offered something for everyone, conveniently located close to Kamloops and had plenty of activities to keep them busy.